Thursday, August 18, 2011

Alec Baldwin Goes Downtown

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: What's old quickly becomes new again in the world of celebrity real estate. Two weeks ago the peeps at The Postreported that Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning actor Alec Baldwin listed his long-time home at the high-toned and twin-towered Eldorado building on New York City's Central Park West with an asking price of $9,500,000.

What was not mentioned was that Mister Baldwin attempted to sell the 3 bedroom and 3.5 bathroom spread on the 22nd floor at The Eldorado way back in August 2009 with a much lower asking price of $7,500,000. It doesn't take clicks and flicks of the hard-working beads on Your Mama's bejeweled abacus to determine that Mister Baldwin and his Real Estate have seen fit to jack up the price by a full two million dollars even though, arguably, the real estate economy isn't all that much better today than it was two years ago.

Anyhoo, at the very same time Mister Baldwin listed his 22nd floor co-operative apartment at The Eldorado he also listed a second 1-bedroom unit with 12-foot ceilings on the ground floor of the building with an asking price of $1,200,000. This unit no longer appears on the open market nor is is mentioned in current listing information for Mister Baldwin's bigger unit upstairs. Make of that what you will.

Mister Baldwin has been on on the house for new digs in The Big Apple for quite some time. Originally his search centered around Upper West Side where he reportedly peeped at numerous fancy pads including places at the troubled Apthorp building and a 4 bedroom spread at The Dakota priced at $12,500,000.

Ultimately 50-something year old Mister Baldwin turned his real estate attentions downtown where his plan, as per all the New York City property gossips, is to buy a new crib where he can bunk in the lap of luxury with his much younger 28-year old lady-friend, yoga instructor Hilaria Thomas.

Within days of The Post reporting on Mister Baldwin's (re-)listing of his Upper West Side aerie, a real estate snitch whispered to the fine folks at Curbed that Mister Baldwin has signed contracts to purchase a duplex penthouse at the newly renovated Devonshire House in Greenwich Village's hoity-toity Gold Coast 'hood. The hulking red-brick pre-war edifice was originally designed by noted and beloved architect Emery Roth who, coincidentally, also designed the geometric Art Deco magnificence that is The Eldorado.

Mister Baldwin (allegedly and reportedly) opted for a 4,137 square foot penthouse pad at Devonshire House that last carried an asking price of $12,500,000. Listing information shows the posh penthouse–with interiors done up and did over by big-time decorator Victoria Hagan–contains 3 sizable bedrooms, each with private (and windowed) pooper. The large master suite, tucked into a oblique corner of the building with eastern and northern views, features an entry vestibule with coat closet–which we love–a windowed bathroom with separate glass-enclosed shower and raised soaking tub, private sitting area/study, and a dressing hall lined with closets.

The main living space pinwheels around a floating staircase and includes a formal dining room, living room with fireplace, and eat-in kitchen with center island breakfast bar plus room for a table, white Shaker-style cabinets, crisp white counter tops and grey-veined marble back splash, deep farm house sink and commercial-style stainless steel appliances.

The floor plan, as marked up in marketing materials, shows a somewhat awkward relationship between the foyer, living room, kitchen and dining room. As marked, one has to go through the kitchen or dining room in order to get to the living room. Iffin this were Your Mama and the Dr. Cooter's $12,500,000 penthouse we'd probably make the dining room the living room and the living room the dining room in an effort to promote a more harmonious relationship between the public spaces.

The second floor contains a family room/den with built-in wet bar, windowed bathroom and access to two terraces, a smaller one that overlooks the building's courtyard and a larger one that hangs over tree-lined East 10th Street.

76 comments:

hippie canyon
said...

Mama you're right. The FDR is the ideal location for the living room. Great apartment, but there must've been a sale on that kitchen design -- especially those hanging lights. They are in almost every kitchen from coast to coast.

I think Ms Hagan's decorating is pure yawn. This is exceptionally bad. Does she do staging now? There is nothing here that I can imagine would make Mr. Baldwin jump from what was undoubtedly a great building/apartment. Kim Basinger is probably LOL hysterically right now.

It may be just me, but in my opinion, everything Victoria Hagan touches turns out stunningly beautiful and impeccably styled. The staging of this unit is nowhere near as nice as the original models for the building, but the finishes that she chose are right up my alley.

I'm a bit dumbfounded that after all the time he took scouting his next home out, this is the one he chose. I have a mental block against even having to consider using the LR as a DR and vice versa for anything I'd spend $12,500,000 on, and yet it's the only practical option here, unless you like living weird at an exorbitant price (bathroom off the formal dining room - perhaps that's the eclectic point). Maybe I'm too picky, but nothing about this apartment beckons or speaks me.

I think he's buying the place so he can be mayor. He has to live in NYC officially.

One can only hope he's not acting like a completely idiotic old fool and letting some young (gold digging) broad he's known for six months take his ass to the cleaners. You can almost see the train wreck happening... These foreign women act all coy and virtuous until they get credit cards and cars then turn into greedy nightmares.